How to keep your Google Drive data safe forever

Google Drive can be a very helpful tool, especially when it comes to keeping track of all the different projects and assignments students at City have to do. Unfortunately, many of our Google drives are made and owned by GRPS. That also means that when you graduate, GRPS can simply delete your account and all the work you have done at City with it. Worse, GRPS might update our usernames at any time which would also delete all of your data. Luckily, in compliance with GDPR and other online information laws, major internet companies like Google are required to give you all of your data in a form that can be used without their service at any time. This is a simple guide on how to keep your data safe. The screenshots below are based on how this is done on a desktop computer, but the process can be completed just as easily from a phone or other mobile device.

Step 1

Navigate to your account settings by clicking the profile image in the upper right hand corner of the Google homepage.

Step 2

Click the blue “Google Account” button.

Step 3

Select “start transfer” under the “Transfer your content” section of the account management home page.

Step 4

Enter a destination account and select the data you want to transfer to complete the process. Your data may take up to a week to migrate to the new account.

Step 5 (optional)

This is an optional second method for preserving your data to use if you don’t like Google and would prefer to start using another service. This system will convert any data you want, up to and including your entire Google account, into a .zip archive which you can email to yourself and download onto nearly any computer.